Duwayne Lake - Operations Director at Veco
Connect with Duwayne on Linkedin
What is your career background?
I started my career in the freight industry - first as an air freight import and export clerk, followed by air freight import clerk, then moving into sea freight as an import manager. I then started to feel like the industry wasn’t challenging me enough, so I undertook some Microsoft qualifications, before taking on the role of an IT support technician, for one of the world’s largest elevator and escalator companies.
How did you come to work for Veco?
A good friend of mine worked at Eurolink and told me great things about the business and how innovative the team were. Fortunately, a great opportunity came up in the IT department. I came for an interview and the rest is history!
What's your proudest achievement?
I have helped to create and be a part of an efficient support team that puts our client’s needs first. This success is backed by our average feedback scores being consistently over 9 and sometimes even 10 month after month, despite the sheer number of individual feedback scores.
What are the top 3 challenges you believe your business solves for agents?
1. Automation is key part of what we do, allowing for many of the day-to-day, time-consuming processes to be taken out of the hands of people.
2. A fast, efficient and knowledgeable support service which allows us to address any queries or issues our clients might have, to enable them to get on and focus on their job.
3. A one-system approach to CRM software, allowing all departments and teams to share and work from the same set of data which increases business efficiency.
Which industry suppliers do you admire most?
Microsoft Azure’s cloud computing platform has allowed us to launch some elements of our products and much of our key support and business tools, which has enabled us to provide some of our products and services in a better and more efficient way. I also have great admiration for Fixflo, as they saw a gap in the market and have filled it with an outstanding product that a lot of the industry find very useful to support property management. Fixflo has fundamentally changed how repair and maintenance issue are managed in homes and places of work. Its smart, a cloud-based software solutions helping property managers improve efficiency, exceed customer expectations and stay compliant with regulatory requirements.
Which estate agencies do you admire most?
There are too many to mention as we work with so many good agents! I have utmost admiration for Connells, who have gone from strength to strength. Seymours of Surrey have also achieved great success - in particular the lettings division, which started with small beginnings and has now grown to be one of the area’s leading lettings and management agents, in such a short space of time. I could go on, but we’d run out of space so I’ll leave it there…….
What is the most valuable lesson you have learnt from working with estate agents so far?
That customer service is key, which is a core value of the agents we work with. And in turn, we like to support them with a customer-centric approach, putting them at the centre of everything that we do.
